Envision the Future

Do you ever dream about what your parish or our collaborative will look like in 3 years? This is a question that I have been pondering with the staff, the Parish Councils and the Finance Councils now for nearly a year and a half. We also have a Collaborative Pastoral Plan writing team in place that is also doing the hard work of trying to form a vision for the next three years. And not just a vision, but concrete goals and objectives as well.

When complete our pastoral plan will have goals and objectives that are achievable and measurable that we can look at in three years and say this is what we accomplished. While it is difficult to get feedback from everyone on every detail, I’d like to take this opportunity to ask you to consider a question: What do you think we can look like as the Catholic community in Walpole in three years? While it’s perfectly fine to stop me after Mass and tell me what you think, I’d like to ask you to pray about this, to ponder it and then to send me what you come up with. You can email me at
frchip@matt13catholic.org or you can mail me a letter to the office at 10 Diamond Street, however you would like to share these thoughtful visions.

Now I’d like to caution that this is about your hopeful vision for future, not the airing of grievances or complaints, however legitimate they may be. We want to create a plan for the future that carries out the mission given to us by Jesus Christ to make disciples and love one another. We want to think about the positive things we can do for the future, and not dwell on real or perceived hurts of the past. (Of course, I welcome legitimate inquiries or requests regarding problems in the parishes, but let’s keep those separate for now.)

Some of you know that I am a fan of the British television program “Dr. Who” which is about an enigmatic time-travelling alien and his companion who can literally go to any time or space using a machine called the TARDIS. I wish I had a TARDIS right now so that some of us could jump ahead three years to see how we’ve done with our pastoral plan, because I am truly excited for the future. The future is what we need to be focused on and how we can be a center of the new evangelization right here in Walpole. As I wrote, the goal is to create disciples, not just among those who already come to Mass, but among those who don’t join us on Sundays too. The Catholic Church has always been about reaching out beyond ourselves. We just have to look at the missionary activity of our history. Well, today, we are in mission territory again. It may sound strange to hear that, but when we look around us and see how few live the faith or attend church or profess belief, it becomes apparent. So let’s dream a little, let’s wonder a little and let’s pray a lot asking Jesus for direction and having hearts that are open to the movement of the Holy Spirit.